DOWNINGTOWN — A high school Latin language teacher decided her students would benefit from a resource for synonyms. She couldn’t find one, so she wrote her own.

Christine Meyer, a teacher at Downingtown West, had her Latin thesaurus published last June.

Two years ago, she said her students read Vergil’s Aeneid. Meyer asked them to keep track of the vocabulary and write the synonyms.

That summer Meyer attended an eight-day workshop to write Latin poetry, sponsored by the University of Michigan. She said the attendees had one practical resource available for their use, but no manual.

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“As I struggled to create Latin verse in meter, I keenly understood the need for synonyms,” Meyer said.

The following January, Meyer attended the American Philological Association conference. When she visited the book tables she said she had a conversation with Bolchazy-Carducci Publishers, who encouraged her to write a proposal about her idea for a thesaurus.

“Bolchazy has always been one of my favorite classics publishers, and I have found their trove of books to be of great use to me over the years,” Meyer said.

Bolchazy accepted Meyer’s summer proposal in the fall.

She said she was excited to include her student last year in the writing process during the academic year. The advanced students evaluated some of the lists for effectiveness and utility.

Meyer said one student, Faith Bull, made it her graduation project to assist with the thesaurus. Bull and Meyer met at the Chester County Library on Saturdays to work.

Meyer said without her student’s help, she would not have met the deadline.

She said her primary challenge was time as she was teaching full time during the early winter deadline. While she said she had previously written notes, she had four months to meet the publisher’s deadline.

Months of editing and proofing followed that, she said.

Meyer, 56, said she thinks the students benefited from their exposure to the processes of writing and editing, as well as the demands of meeting a deadline.

Meyer said she had fun when she consulted her students for their opinions on the artwork that the publisher had sent to her and that would eventually accompany the words.

Meyer, a teacher for 14 years, she teaches all levels of Latin at Downingtown West High School. Meyer, the Latin club adviser, was recognized for her work during a school board meeting.

Because she also teaches 11th grade English, Meyer said, “I believe that any person who wants to increase his or her vocabulary would find the thesaurus useful.”

She said that is why she titled it “Latin Synonyms for Language Lovers: A Select Thesaurus.”

Meyer noted that more than 65 percent of the English dictionary derives from Latin. She said the study of Latin words can benefit those who want to have as much access to their own English language as possible.

She dedicated the thesaurus, in several Latin verses, to her maternal grandfather, Patrick August Deluca. Although she said she did not include his name in the dedication, she referred to him as the “progenitor Calaber,” the Calabrian forefather.

Calabria is the area of Italy where her mother’s family lived in the 19th century.

“Poppa Deluca was my true reader, always asking for my writing and saving it in his work filing cabinet,” Meyer said. “Hence, in the dedication I refer to ‘arcas onustas,’ or ‘weighty boxes.’”

She also dedicated her book to Latin teachers, who she said regard their subject and their students as having inestimable worth.

“I believe that Latin teachers heroically and individually preserve a language that most people wrongly perceive as useless and worthless,” she said.